capture settings VHS download from camcorder

[petrea]

I have read several of the recommendations but am having trouble setting the capture settings
A. Am capturing thru a canon dv camcorder - have no trouble connecting but believe I am setting the capture properties incorrectly as the quality is very poor.
I would like to fit @ 2hours of video on a DVD
The editing is minimal (mostly deletions and adding chapters & menu)

I clicked on capture properties
Understand I should have the following
Upper field 1st
frame size: 352X240
rate: 4000 vs 8000

When I click on VCD I get the right frame size but can't select
upper field 1st and the rate only goes to @1600
When I select mpg 2 I can get the right settings for everything except
the frame size (standard 720x480

Can you help me figure out what I am doing wrong?
Thanks
Petrea

[BrianCee]

Almost everything by the look of it - if you are capturing using your camcorder as a analogue to digital converter with the intention of creating a high quality DVD then you should be capturing and editing as .avi with the following settings (assuming you are in an NTSC area) :-

NTSC drop frame (29.97 fps)
Microsoft AVI files
24 Bits, 720 x 480, 4:3 (or 16:9 for widescreen), 29.97 fps
Lower Field First
DV Video Encoder -- type 1
DV Audio -- NTSC, 48.000 kHz, 16 Bit, Stereo

Have you read the recommended procedure which you will find here :-

http://phpbb.ulead.com.tw/EN/viewtopic.php?t=27

.

[PeterMilliken]

Hi Petrea,

You specify that you want 2 hours to fit onto a DVD and that you are capturing through a DV Camcorder.

My suggestion is that you don't play with the quality of capture! You should capture your video as though it was a DV tape i.e. use the default DV capture settings and then 'play' with the output settings when you render the output to achieve the level of quality that you desire and the amount of space you have i.e. use 4000 instead of 8000, perhaps use DVD Shrink or look at doing the DVD over two discs instead of one or perhaps purchase a Dual Layer burner - they really are so cheap these days you could virtually go without buying lunch at work for a week or two (make your sandwiches the night before) and use the saved lunch money to buy an appropriate burner (for example, I can buy a Pioneer 110D DL burner here for $60 AUD - that is less than 2 weeks lunch money).

There really are plenty of options to achieve what you want - but I suggest that they should all be applied after the capture - not before!

Peter

[Ron P.]

Petrea,

***EDIT***
Peter beat me to this.. Follow his advice..

The frame size indicates a VCD not DVD. DVD's are to be 720 x 480 (NTSC) or 720 x 576 (PAL).

I don't know if you are in PAL land or NTSC, however for DVD you should select from the drop down menu, a DVD template, not VCD. VCD will not allow 720 x 480.

Ron P.

[sjj1805]

I have read several of the recommendations but am having trouble setting the capture settings
A. Am capturing thru a canon dv camcorder - have no trouble connecting but believe I am setting the capture properties incorrectly as the quality is very poor.
I would like to fit @ 2hours of video on a DVD
The editing is minimal (mostly deletions and adding chapters & menu)

I clicked on capture properties
Understand I should have the following
Upper field 1st
frame size: 352X240
rate: 4000 vs 8000

When I click on VCD I get the right frame size but can't select
upper field 1st and the rate only goes to @1600
When I select mpg 2 I can get the right settings for everything except
the frame size (standard 720x480

Can you help me figure out what I am doing wrong?
Thanks
Petrea

You are selecting the wrong format. VCD is when you use CD discs and you can squeeze up to a hour onto one.

You should be using DVD and then it depends upon how much you want to squeeze onto the disc. For best quality a bit rate of
8000 will get you about a hour.
6000 will get you about hour and half
4000 about 2 hours.

I have even squeezed 4 hours onto a DVD disc using 2000 and the quality still looked equal/better than the days of VHS tapes.

Steve J

[petrea]

I hear what you are saying. Here is what I was hoping to avoid - a huge gb file.
When I go for top quality a one hour file is up to 4.7 gb. I am transfering a tape that is about 5 hours long. With the higher quality it stops to transcribe (and doesn't stop the player) that seems to occur every 7 minutes or so meaning I have to babysit the download constantly.
Since I am dealing with a VHS tape there is also a limit to the quality just based on the original.
When I read the instructions they suggested that I could go down as low as the 352 to 240 window (found this in the "Avoid problems: Use recomendation (phpbb.ulead.comtw/EN/viewtopic.php?t=27.
However, sounds like that is really not an option.??
Petrea

[sjj1805]

I think you would be better splitting it into two.
Then
MPEG files
24 Bits, 352 x 576, 25 fps
(DVD-PAL), 4:3
Video data rate: Variable (Max. 2500 kbps)
Audio data rate: 256 kbps
AC-3 Audio, 48 KHz, 2/0(L,R)

or for NTSC
MPEG files
24 Bits, 352 x 480, 29.97 fps
(DVD-NTSC), 4:3
Video data rate: Variable (Max. 2500 kbps)
Audio data rate: 224 kbps
MPEG audio layer 2, 48 KHz, Stereo

This should be good for 3 hours on each disc = 6 hours.
Don't forget your menus will also take up a little bit of overhead.

Steve J

[petrea]

I can try that when I go to do the video and burn the disc. However, doesn't help my download problem.
Maybe the dv camcorder isn't my best bet.
Since ulead doesn't stop the play when it transcribes with the DVD option for download it really won't work
All I can think of is to go back to filming (one hour at a time) and then downloading from the camcorder.
Do you have a better suggestion for conversion to digital? Do the "stand-alone dvd recorders work and are they editable - since I am looking at quite a few tapes maybe using ulead is "overkill"/

[sjj1805]

I converted over 300 VHS tapes to DVD using Ulead.
My method was to use a Hauppauge TV card. Only problem here is that the Hauppauge only captures in MPEG format which can be problematic when you want to edit stuff out such as adverts. You have to be careful of audio/video synch issues.

Never a problem with AVI files but you dont always get the choice.
Anyway, whatever method you have for getting the video into the computer it matters not if you capture a hour at a time or 5 hours.
Using videoStudio you can break it up into smaller chunks after you have gotten it into the computer.

I wrote a Tutorial for the capture procedure using a Hauppauge TV card and either Movie Factory 4 or the software native to the Hauppauge card WinTV2000. The procedure is similar with VideoStudio.

http://phpbb.ulead.com.tw/EN/viewtopic.php?t=11379

Regards
Steve J

[PeterMilliken]

I would have thought the DV camcorder route is the best one - certainly it is what I use. I don't understand why VS9 stops capturing after 7 minutes (especially as you say on higher quality settings) - normally VS9 stops capturing when it thinks there is nothing to capture i.e. end of tape, so is there something in your VHS tape that makes it think this is happening?

Perhaps actually record your analog signal on a mini-DV tape and then capture it? This is a bit of "double handling" but would certainly be preferable to babysitting the capture session or to go out and buy capture hardware (like the Hauppauge card that Steve recommends).

I am at work here, so I can't check, but is there something in the capture settings that allow you to tell VS9 to stop capturing when end of tape is detected? I can't remember...

Peter

[petrea]

Thanks for your help. I do need to remove a lot of ads. The "stopping" problem occurs when it downloads the buffer. While ulead stops recording the during this period - the vhs continues to run.
I have gone back to "two-stepping" it - inputting on film and then downloading it from the film to the computer. Using this procedure when the "download of the buffer" occurs it does stop the film and then picks up automatically when ulead is done. I was hoping to avoid this step - but it will work.
I did reduce the bit from 8000 to 4000, upper frame first and left all other std DVD terms in place. I am now testing but think quality is ok and this does reduce the file sizes.
Thanks again
Petrea